The present invention relates to an artificial lens and the method for implanting such lens in the eye to cooperate with the natural lens for correcting the eyesight of the eye in question.
The natural lens in the human eye is deformable and attached at its periphery by zonules which allow the biconvex natural lens to be deformed from a first condition in which the lens is flattest (i.e., non-accommodating), to a second condition in which the natural lens is more convex than in said first condition. Thus, the normal, healthy natural lens can conform to the optical power which is required.
In those cases where the natural lens does not properly accommodate to achieve the desired vision, or in other cases where the length of the eyeball is such that the image from a healthy lens falls short or behind the retina, spectacles or contact lenses are required to compensate for the deficiency of the natural lens or axial length. Such external devices are cumbersome, particularly in cases of high degree of myopia where the external lenses have to be quite thick in order to adequately compensate.
Spectacles have the disadvantages that they are often uncomfortable to wear, can fall off and break and are frequently perceived as marring the appearance of the wearer. Contact lenses, on the other hand, cannot be tolerated by everyone and even those who can tolerate such lenses face well known problems associated therewith. For example, the necessity to maintain the lenses absolutely clean, difficulties in removing and inserting the lenses, occasional unpleasant irritation as a result of wearing the contact lenses, possible infection and, on occasion, losing a lens.